North Korea tells EU to 'mind its own business' over UN human rights resolution

Pyongyang's response

North Korea's mission to the United Nations has answered a draft UN resolution on human rights in the country, put forward by the European Union, by telling the bloc to mind its own business. The statement, carried by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), called the draft a 'farce' and a 'politically motivated provocation' and said it distorts the country's human rights policy in a flagrant way. The mission argued that human rights are not a monopoly of the West. It pointed to demonstrators in European cities, Paris and Brussels among them, whom it said were demanding basic rights such as the right to existence. The sharpest line of the statement read:

“The EU had better mind its own business, instead of hyping up the non-existent 'human rights issues'”

What the UN has documented

The UN General Assembly has adopted a resolution condemning North Korea's human rights violations every year since 2005. Last year the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights warned that the situation had not improved over the past decade and had worsened in several respects. A 14-page report from the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights describes an expanded use of the death penalty, including execution by shooting. The report links these measures to an effort to instil a culture of fear and to cut citizens off from outside cultural influences. According to the report, at least six new laws adopted over the past 10 years widened the range of offences that can carry the death penalty. Watching and distributing foreign content, including TV episodes and films, is among those offences, and North Koreans have been executed partly for watching foreign films. The Office concluded that no other population faces such restrictions in today's world.

The draft resolution's path

The draft is expected to be adopted by the Third Committee of the UN General Assembly later in November 2026, before it goes to a final vote in the full General Assembly. The milestones in the coverage run from the annual resolutions that began in 2005 to the mission's statement on Thursday, 5 November 2026. The sequence is shown in the chart below.

South Korea's co-sponsorship

South Korea has decided to co-sponsor the EU's draft, according to the Yonhap News Agency cited by Deutsche Welle. It would be the fifth consecutive year that Seoul has co-sponsored the resolution. Seoul's earlier break ran from 2019 to 2021, under the liberal government of Moon Jae-in. Final approval rests with the General Assembly in plenary, after the Third Committee has voted.